Produced in collaboration with SBS Urdu
TRANSCRIPT
90-year-old Catalina Macahron who migrated from the Philippines and now lives in Sydney’s west, is taking a meal delivered by a volunteer.
“Thank you. Thank you to coming. Thank you. Where do you want me to put it for you? Oh inside. You want me to put it inside? Yeah yeah yeah thank you very much my darling.”
With most of her seven children living overseas, Ms Macahron is a client of Meals on Wheels. The community care organisation delivers 4.5 million meals annually in NSW alone, helping older people or those living with a disability to remain in their homes.
And it’s not just dropping off meals. Volunteers support their clients in other ways too, as driver Lynn Quinn explains.
“It's just something that you give and you just get back. And its sometimes it's just doing a little thing for 'em that they couldn't do. It might be: ‘Oh can you reach up and get that thing down off the shelf? For me, I can't reach it’. It's little things like that that the volunteers do for the people that they go into and meet that just make a difference in those people's lives.”
Ms Quinn is among 14,000 volunteers in New South Wales alone who deliver meals supporting a diverse range of clients.
“My roster now is once every three weeks. However, sometimes when they're short of volunteers, they'll give me a ring and say: ‘oh, can I come in and do an extra one?’ And so I will do that definitely if I'm available, I will always come in and do extra.”
Ms Quinn’s can-do attitude recently helped her to reach an incredible milestone. She is now Australia’s longest serving Meals on Wheels volunteer, after 50 years on the road.
“I set myself a goal and then I got to 47 years. And when I got to that, I said, ‘well, I don't set a lot of records’ so I thought I'm going to set a record and I'm going to try to go to 50.”
Having achieved her half-century goal and despite turning 81 this month, Ms Quinn says she has NO intention of hanging up the car keys.
“While I can keep driving myself, I will keep doing it. The appreciation from that one person that you are the one person in their daily life, that they see someone with the daily delivery of meals that they see and have conversation with, it just brightens their life and it brightens your life.”
Taking time for a chat is a big part of what makes this service so valuable in a culturally diverse suburb like Sydney’s Canterbury-Bankstown where 200 languages are spoken, according to local mayor Bilal El-Hayek, who migrated from Lebanon.
He says loneliness and isolation can be a problem for many with extended families living overseas.
“This could be the only human contact they have with our volunteers for that week. So, this service not only about delivering a meal, this service is also about having that human contact. If anyone that needs any support in the community, whether you're elderly or you're disadvantaged, or have a disability, please reach out to one of our team members and they'll be more than happy to help and support you.”
In fact, Councillor El-Hayek regularly delivers Meals on Wheels himself, he says it helps to connect with his multi-cultural constituents.
“I do this every week. This is the thing that keeps me grounded. Seeing people's struggles, seeing what people are going through. So I do it because I enjoy it. I love giving back to the community.”
With many of Australia’s most vulnerable struggling to afford fresh food, Councillor El-Hayek says a home delivery of healthy meals is more crucial than ever!
“It’s tough. People are going through a tough period of time in their lives. We have a housing crisis, but the cost of living as well is a big issue that we have here in Canterbury- Bankstown. The average income, is not the highest in Australia. And I say this all the time, we struggle, but we always look out for one another and we try to support each other as much as possible.”
Even so, volunteer numbers have dropped in recent years and Cr El-Hayek says more helping hands are needed !
“During covid we lost a fair few volunteers. We had almost 150 volunteers and now we have 75 volunteers, so the call out is always important. So, if there's anyone out there that would like to give us a hand, please make sure we reach out to the team. Any support is much appreciated.”
It’s one reason Ms Quinn is keen to keep going, supporting residents from more than 120 different backgrounds.
“It's the right thing to do. It involves you, you meet so many different types of people and that broadens your own horizons because I think all of us can get very narrow in our beliefs. I am very, very lucky because I have a daughter that looks after me who's never left home and looks after me magnificently! So, because I'm so well looked after - to give back to those people that don't have that, because I know how very fortunate I am.”
